


Antivan traditions

by tuisku



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alternative Sexuality, Awkward Kissing, Bisexual Alistair (Dragon Age), Kissing, M/M, Making Out, Sexual Confusion, Sexuality Crisis, Zevran being Zevran, basically zevran flirts around a lil and alistair is Unsure but not necessarily uncomfortable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 11:27:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9605792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuisku/pseuds/tuisku
Summary: What a coincidence! Zevran’s two favorite things both start with the same letter: Antiva’s culture, and Alistair.





	

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by [rockboci's wonderful comic](http://rockboci.tumblr.com/post/155159258903)!
> 
> boy'o'boy i'm posting my writing for the first time ever and i haven't... even told anyone i write... so yeah this is definitely not beta read, sorry if there are a thousand mistakes, please be gentle if you leave a comment (which i'd greatly appreciate!! god i so lack the confidence for this)  
> but maker's blessings upon rockboci and all their dragon age work, go follow them immediately if you appreciate the finer art of your favorite save-the-world dating sim! i'm not kidding they're gold  
> that being said............. enjoy..???

It comes out of nowhere, as most of the things Zevran says – especially if, and inevitably when, they’re alone.

He doesn’t bother to look up from the dagger he’s polishing. “Tell me, my dear Alistair. Would you like to kiss me?”

The man questioned swallows his cheese wrong, the piece in his throat big and uncomfortable enough to bring tears to his eyes. Alistair hates it when Amell leaves for a mission without either of them, or when she takes them both with her; mostly because she does it just to tease him, then also because he doesn’t like Zevran. Or, it’s not about liking him, it’s about trusting him, which Alistair cannot even begin to imagine.

He’s coloring up; feels it, hates it. He thought he’d became immune to Zevran’s flirting and flattery, but never had he ever been this straightforward.

Thudding his chest a few times with his fist, Alistair manages out something like, ‘excuse me,’ still coughing and swallowing in turns to get the cheese through to his stomach, and looks at Zevran. He has an easy, self-satisfied smirk on his face, a little lopsided to the left, some teeth visible.

He knows Alistair heard him but it doesn’t stop him from spelling it out a little slower. “Would you like to kiss me?” 

Frustrated, Alistair turns to the fire and the smoke blows right in his face but he doesn’t _care_ , he’d rather go blind than have this conversation with Zevran, and pokes the half-raw meal-to-be hare around with a sword too worn to battle with.

“It is a common way to greet people in Antiva, and I rather like to spread the culture.”

“Right,” he stretches the i, “but we met weeks ago. It would be pointless now.” Maker, he didn’t want the assassin with them in the first place, and he certainly doesn’t want to be his next target now – murder _or_ bedding. Definitely not bedding.

“Yet, we’ve still to properly introduce ourselves, no?”

He’s not giving up. Alistair decides he won’t either, even if his ears feel so hot they feel cold. “I didn’t grow up in that country.”

“Ah,” Zevran looks thoughtful for half a second there and––is he closer? He was sitting right opposite of Alistair a second before. “But I believe I just told you I like to spread the culture. Antiva is _incredibly_ rich in traditions, and us natives don’t want them to die down. Think of it as, mmm, having dogs in this Ferelden of yours. What would it be without them?”

Alistair side-eyes him, considers. He’s totally being led on. Zevran knows of his inexperience in these things – seems to be a popular subject amongst the party – and just wants to be a bully, shake him up for his own entertainment. “ _We_ natives don’t offer a dog to everyone we meet.”

Zevran glances at Amell’s mabari. It was announced to be everyone’s, so it’d know to take orders from not only her to be more useful in battle; raises his brows, more than a little amused.

“Okay, listen, Amell here–”

Suddenly his mouth is full of something else than words completely – well, not his _mouth_ , or _full_ , but there’s some excessive pressure on his lips and it takes Alistair a moment to register that Zevran is now, indeed, introducing himself.

Alistair drops the sword and its handle lands on his left foot but he can’t really jump from the pain, or react anyhow anyways. Zevran moves his hand to rest on his thigh just above the knee, pulling away to get barely a centimeter of distance between them, meets his eyes through his lashes and prompts, “It would be polite to introduce yourself back, yes?”

Alistair inhales through his nose by reflex, clouded in Zevran’s strong foreign scent, and absent-mindedly places his hand over the smaller one. Zevran smiles but doesn’t look away and Alistair knows he must say something, _anything_ , and the first Maker-forbidden thing that comes to mind is, “Do you want me to give you a dog?”

The smile turns into a grin. Zevran kisses him again, this time a little more demanding – presses in just enough to have Alistair press back against not to fall on his back and now somehow, even sitting up he feels like he needs to hold onto something, so he brings his hands to both sides of Zevran’s neck. This seemingly gives him a free passage onto his lap.

(Zevran keeps a polite distance between their crotches, and Alistair could not possibly be more grateful.)

It’s a little crowded between them with his arms squished together but apparently having read his mind, Zevran guides them lower to his waist, and oh, everything is so much easier and they’re so much closer, chest-to-chest. He works his fingers in Alistair’s hair and earns himself a sigh; it’s all sensation and Alistair’s losing himself in it, but right now, that’s quite alright.

It’s not, by any means, heated or fast or about sharing spit; Zevran knows exactly what to do, like to tilt his head in a better angle when he takes Alistair’s upper lip between his teeth for a lingering second, then let go for just as long before closing the gap between again, meanwhile Alistair just tries to keep up. He closes his arms around Zevran, who then digs his nails in Alistair’s neck in return, slips forward, hums into his mouth appreciatively; it’s like they’re melting into each other, like…

Like suffocating, when Alistair realizes there’s no air in his lungs and has to lean away and breathe.

He finds his shoulders heaving and hears Zevran’s breaths coming out short too, which is oddly comforting, though he doesn’t sound as out of it as Alistair feels. He keeps his eyes closed, drops his forehead against Zevran’s collarbone. His left hand is still in Alistair’s hair in a light fist around it, the right one on his chest directly on top of his heart. He feels its beat against his hand; wonders if it’s from excitement or fear or disgust, wishes for the best.

“If ‘dog’ is some Fereldenian slang for this, then by all means, do give me a dog. Multiple, if you have to spare.”

Alistair would’ve laughed if he’d had the capacity, and gives Zevran a shy smile instead. He’s more than just a bit conflicted about the whole situation.

By an enormous urge to, he looks somewhere, anywhere, _everywhere_ but the assassin, and asks after a short choosing of the right words, “So… you greet everyone like this?”

“Only the really intriguing ones.” Alistair snorts.

“Well, now we’ve met. Satisfied?” He tries to seem as careless about it as he can, but it’s not a lot that he can; wears his heart on his sleeve and not even his best gauntlets keep it hidden enough. He kind of wishes his first kiss wouldn’t have been with a man but now he’s at least kissed, and hey – before this he’d wished _none_ of his future kisses would be with a man. (…he isn’t quite sure if he wishes there would be more man-kissing from now on.) Progress, he supposes.

“Oh, _very_ ,” Zevran pushes his palms against Alistair’s shoulders, flings his leg over to get up, “but I am certain there are more sides to you, yes? To me, definitely. We could get to know each other better some other time, if you wish.”

A flash of a thought of ‘why not now’ passes by Alistair’s head but before he can suggest it aloud, he hears Amell’s horn and turns back to stare at his hands, suddenly as embarrassed as when Zevran first opened his stupid, soft mouth. _What!_ Perhaps it was for the best it was this exact moment that she returned with the others.

“Tell her I’ll… be in my tent. If she asks.” Zevran waves him off with a knowing expression, feeling a little triumphant.

#

Alistair straight out dives into his tent and splashes everything in his water flask on his face, pushes his palms so hard against his eyes it hurts. He really, really, _really_ didn’t plan for things (himself?) to turn out like this or ever even consider such a possibility, but neither can he say it’s the end of the world, as much as he’d like to. He’s––he just… he just needs to think about everything. Mostly Zevran. He still doesn’t trust him, still doesn’t want to start now, or rather doesn’t want to start to want to now, but _something_ happened there and while it probably was just Zevran showing off or throwing him off-balance or trying another way to prove himself trustworthy, Alistair can’t decide if that something was good or bad.

He’s going to sleep. When he sleeps, he’s with darkspawn that won’t try to involve anything intimate aside from the thrill of death, and when he sleeps with the darkspawn he can’t think about Zevran. Hopefully. Getting out of most of his clothes, Alistair buries himself in his way-too-thin excuse of a blanket, begins to doze off to the background noise of his companions, and then, of all things, remembers the hare.

**Author's Note:**

> i don't own/claim dragon age nor its characters! just borrowed them a little


End file.
